Vengeance Will Only Hurt You

I’ve seen plenty of circumstances in life when people have felt truly wronged. I’ve witnessed men lose limbs and seen the sobs of men who have had their friends ripped from existence. I’ve seen the faces of once-warm people, turned cold with pain, suffering, and fear. I’ve seen what the pain of loss can do to a person. I’ve met hardened men and later thought to myself, “those guys are emotionally compromised; they are incapable of doing what they need to do.”

When you experience such extreme amounts of pain, if allowed, it will change you. Your heart will become cold. You will learn to hate. You will want vengeance. You must never allow yourself to become vengeful. Vengeance, retribution, retaliation; these actions will destroy you.

How can you tell if you are becoming a vengeful person?

A vengeful person seeks confrontation, berating people who remind them of those who did them wrong. If you are vengeful you seek to turn others against someone. You blame other people for everything that goes wrong. You avoid people and situations that remind you of terrible circumstances. You create disturbances or problems with people associated with individuals, or even try to get people in trouble at work. In extreme circumstances, if left unchecked, you become the kind of person that murders people who remind you of the one(s) who wronged you.

We all know the stories of various war crimes; atrocities committed against innocent people because they reminded the offenders of the subject of their hate. Hatred seems to lead to generalizations which equate to racism and end in hate crimes.

We all suffer from loss. None of us started the day expecting to receive the phone call which bore such terrible news. None of us thought we would see people we care about get hurt or killed. We don’t go through our day expecting crimes to be committed against us or our loved ones. Sadly, we all experience these pains to some degree or another. We lose family or friends in terrible accidents, atrocities, violent circumstances. The unforeseen, uncontrolled loss causes us to question our faith. These things, if we allow them, will destroy us and lead us down dark paths.

When you experience terrible things, you have to look inward. No, it isn’t fair these things happened to you. But you have to understand and come to accept the terrible things that happen. You fight back, by staying in control. Allowing your emotions to turn to hate will drive you to vengeance against a person or people that will never undo the past.

You can’t correct the mistakes of others by making your own. You cannot right the wrongs by wronging. You cannot understand by refusing to listen to and understand your own emotions. Seeking vengeance will only hurt you. Choosing to things you would otherwise be morally opposed to will change you forever in a way you don’t want to be changed. Acting only out of anger will make you into a person you do not want to be.

Vengeance will only hurt you. Vengeance will destroy you.